


four times a wolf met a bear in the woods, and one time he didn't

by erolyn2



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-09
Updated: 2013-04-09
Packaged: 2017-12-08 00:10:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/754699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erolyn2/pseuds/erolyn2
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Series of short scenes from various points in pre-series between Ned and Jorah. (And one post-series, when Ned isn't there to meet him anymore.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	four times a wolf met a bear in the woods, and one time he didn't

**Author's Note:**

> This came out of my semi-random headcanon that Ned and Jorah might have been friends as kids. Normally I don't choose show!canon over book!canon, but I hadn't realized that Ned is only 35 in the books. That would make Jorah about eight years older than him, which screwed with my plans here, so for the sake of this story I'm pretending Ned is about the age he looks in the show (early 40's to Jorah's mid-to-early 40's). 
> 
> (And thanks to mrstater for betaing, as usual.)

**1) Winterfell, 266 AL**

When he had seen the glint in Lord Mormont’s son’s eye, Ned had immediately known what the other boy was up to. And sure enough, that afternoon he found a stocky dark-haired youth lying under the broad red leaves of the heart tree in Winterfell’s woods with a large object clutched in his hand.

“What is that?”

Jorah Mormont sat up on his elbows, flashing Ned a lopsided grin. “I found something in the kitchens that you might be interested in…” He dangled a skin of some unknown liquid between his fingers, giving it over easily to his friend’s hands when Ned sat beside him. When he sniffed it, the sour fruit smell made him squint in surprise.

“Wine?” His friend grinned again, the reason behind the glazed look in his eyes now evident. “You _stole_ it?”

“I didn’t ask for it.”

Ned frowned at the wineskin. “You have stolen from your liege lord,” he repeated. “Jorah–”

“Come, Ned, it’s hardly as serious as all that.” Mormont was laughing now, his chuckle already deeper than it had been the year before.

He was near eleven name days already, some two years older than Ned himself, though often more childish in behavior. Sometimes Ned wondered whether they had much in common at all, in fact…Jorah had always reminded him more of Brandon – cocky, arrogant, and quick to anger, but with a quicker mind than Ned’s older brother and without his looks and charm. He was nearer to Brandon’s age as well, yet the Mormont boy had always sought Ned out for company when his father brought him to Winterfell. Eddard knew the boy had little company on his far-flung island but for his aunt and father – certainly there were no males of an age with him – and suspected that he found the oldest Stark son a bit intimidating.

“You’re lucky to be the second son. You can do as you like. Marry who you like. Be a knight, or a builder, or…what have you. No one looks to you. No one expects anything.”

“If I were the heir perhaps I might be allowed to stay in Winterfell,” Ned replied.

His friend blinked up at him in surprise. “Are you going somewhere?”

“To the Eyrie. Father has arranged for me to foster with Jon Arryn.”

Jorah sighed, lying back on the hard ground. “You’re lucky. I’d love to leave the North. See the kingdom. But father says a Lord ought to be near his people...”

“Perhaps I ought to be the Lord of Bear Island, and you Arryn’s ward.”

Ned was rewarded with another loopy smirk, though the look the other boy gave him was serious, thoughtful. “Quiet, composed Eddard Stark. You’d make a better Lord than I.”

“My horse would make a better lord than you.”

He was fortunate that the wine had slowed Jorah’s movements, giving Ned just enough time to duck out of his reach as the other boy swiped at his head.

“Stealing from your lord _and_ attacking his son. You’re accumulating quite a list of crimes today, Mormont.”

“It’ll be a longer list once I catch you, _Stark_.”

They were off through the woods, the wineskin forgotten, and Ned was thankful he hadn’t drunk from it enough that he forgot to return the thing to his father’s kitchens before the sun set.

 

**2) Winterfell, 284 AL**

The next time he found Mormont in the Godswood they had both been wedded and lorded, with a war and nearly twenty years’ time between them.

Jorah leaned against the heart tree, just as he had as a boy, though now Ned suspected it was largely being used as a support.

“Are we not a bit old to be sneaking off from every feast?”

“No one asked you to come here, Stark.”

Mormont’s words were as slurred as they had been the last time they had spoken in this wood, and Ned could hardly keep from grinning at the memory. “Once again you had the foresight to bring the wine with you.”

“Have you come to lecture me this time, as well?”

“No.” Though he ought to have done so, for it was hardly appropriate for Jorah to address his liege lord as “Stark”…but best, perhaps, not to raise that point at the moment. Ned slumped down next to his bannerman, the bark of the weirwood cool against his back. “Though I did wonder why you left the hall so early.”

“You ought to have stayed. Your Tully wife will be missing you.”

“And my son, as well.” But it had been so long since he had ducked away to the Godswood, and finding Jorah there nearly made him forget all that had passed since they were naught but foolish children with simple expectations of their lives.

“ _Robb._ ” Jorah snorted. “Why that name? I would have thought you would call him Brandon, or Rick–” Jorah caught himself, his face gone as white as the tree behind him as he realized what he had said. “Ned, forgive me, I did not mean–”

Ned waved his apologies away with a hand. “Catelyn named him while I was away. For Robert…she said she hoped it would bring luck to our cause.” He could not help but smile, despite himself, at the memory of little Robb there to greet him as he had ridden through the gates of Winterfell, victorious. “There will be other sons to name for my father and brother soon enough.”

Mormont looked paler than ever, and took a large swig from the skin in his hands. Ned suddenly felt a fool; he had nearly forgotten, in his grief over his father and siblings, that Erena Mormont had died during the war as well, and left three unborn children in her wake.

“I heard of your wife’s passing. I am sorry, my friend.”

He shrugged. “To think, after all my father’s matchmaking, I’ll still be the last Lord of Bear Island.”

It was no secret that there had been little love between Jorah and his wife, that it had been as much a marriage of convenience as Ned’s own wedding to Catelyn Tully, yet he had expected some expression of sadness at her passing. _If my wife had died in childbirth, would I have mourned her less than our babe?_ He thought not, but he had also left Cat to birth their heir alone, had hardly stayed long enough after their wedding night to get a son on her. _If I had not come to love her…_

Ned did not want to think too long on that. Instead he remembered Jorah’s complaints of Lord Mormont as a boy, the note of resentment in his voice when she spoke of the Old Bear, even now that he had taken the black.

 “At least your father lives.”

Jorah snorted. “Aye, he has been a great comfort to us, sending his yearly raven from Castle Black.”

For that, he had no response; Ned’s own father had been a stern man who had raised his sons much as Jeor Mormont had raised his. He had offered less comfort than punishment, yet without his firm hand to guide him Ned felt lost. For a brief moment he wanted to ask his friend how he managed to guard his keep alone, but he quickly thought better of it, and Mormont had already spoken again before he could form the words.

“You the Lord of Winterfell, and me a widower. Who would have guessed, eh?”

Ned chuckled drily, grabbing the skin from Jorah’s hands and drinking deep.

“Who’d have guessed, indeed.”

 

**3) Lannisport, 289 AL**

The keep at Lannisport had only a small grove within its walls, an old gnarled oak where a weirwood ought to have stood. Ned had managed to get a message to Lord Mormont the morning before his voyage back to Bear Island – a difficult feat, as the man had scarcely been spotted outside his rooms since his impromptu wedding three days prior.

His old friend met him with his shoulders stiff and his jaw set, looking strikingly like the boy Ned had caught stealing wine from the kitchens in Winterfell.

“I can see you already know what I intend to say.”

“You might have disallowed it, Lord Stark,” Mormont replied coolly, nearly spitting Ned’s title at him. “if you were so opposed to my marriage.”

“You said the words. Far be it from even me to part you now. But Jorah–”

“Have I not done my duty to you, my lord? Have I not fought for the honor and safety of your house, not once but twice now?”

“Aye, you have.”

“Then perhaps you might at least allow me the courtesy of keeping your nose out of my private affairs.”

“That is exactly the problem, as you very well know – your marriage, to a Hightower of Oldtown, no less, is _not_ a private affair–”

“What should I have done then, Ned? Bedded her and left and married for duty instead, as you have? Brought her bastard son back to my keep to raise alongside my trueborn children? You might be happy with your brother’s scraps, but–”

“How _dare_ you speak of my wife– ”

“Yet you may speak freely of mine? Oh, Stark, you never change. Always first to question the actions of others, while the standards you hold for yourself never quite measure up, do they?”

“And you, as always, refuse to believe there is a man in all the realm who knows better than you.” Ned straightened, leveling his gaze down at his bannerman. _Proud and stubborn, like all his kin._ Had he known he would be Warden of the North one day, Ned would never have indulged their childhood friendship. _Hard enough to keep a man of the North at heel,_ he thought, _and I have allowed him too much liberty already._ “Very well, take your bride back to Bear Island, and see how she fares. I wash my hands of it.”

Mormont pushed past without a word, the sound of his boots lingering long after he was gone, and Ned heard nothing more of him but that he and his wife had set sail the next morning.

Eddard Stark might have ridden from Lannisport flush with victory, secure in his hold over the North now Balon Greyjoy and his sons had been subdued; yet dread sat heavy in his gut along each stone of road from the Westerlands to Winterfell, until he was safe in his own castle in the arms of his wife and children.

 

**4) Winterfell, 291 AL**

This time Lord Mormont had clapped him on the shoulder as the night was waning, the first time either of them had ever needed a signal to meet outside the castle walls.

“You were right. She is miserable.”

Ned sighed. That had been apparent the entire evening; the way the Lady of Bear Island carried herself, the way he avoided her husband’s eyes while his barely left her – it was all just as he had feared. Lynesse Hightower, the girl he had seen in Lannisport, was ill fit to be Lynesse Mormont.

“Though my instincts proved correct, I take no pleasure in it. I hope you know that.”

Jorah only nodded, his jaw set again.

The wind blew through the red leaves of the heart tree behind them, their flapping sounds heightening the strained silence in the air.

“What does Maege think of her?”

Mormont’s snort was as close to a laugh as Ned could have hoped for. “What do you think?”

Ned had met Jorah’s aunt and cousins many a time; he could imagine perfectly well how they had taken to Lord Mormont’s pretty, proper wife, who looked as though she had never in her life lifted anything weightier than a fork, much less a sword.

“Catelyn feels ill at ease here at times,” he reminded Mormont, “but she has come to consider Winterfell her home. Perhaps in time…”

“Perhaps.”

But Ned could tell that even Jorah did not believe such a thing was possible. The hall of the Starks was dreary and isolated enough; Bear Island often seemed more akin to the wild lands beyond the Wall than a part of Westeros. _No place for a Southron maid, especially not with Lady Maege’s pack of she-bears at her heels._

“I know how much our children are a comfort to her. Have you tried…”

The expression on Mormont’s face silenced him, and Ned dared not speak again for fear of saying something even worse.

“She seems better when we can leave the island, at least,” Jorah admitted. “I promised to take her as far south from here as I could, but…”

“You cannot stay away forever.”

Mormont shook his head. His family was hardly wealthy, and Ned knew how costly travel would be. He also knew he preferred his lords to remain in the North if they could, in case war threatened again…Bear Island was a quick sail from the Iron Islands and provided a stopping point for Wildlings sailing around the Wall, and Ned was less than pleased to think it might be without its lord for months at a time.

“What are you going to do, Jorah?”

Ned never heard the answer; the sound of footsteps on the grass paused them both, and the two men looked up to find their wives standing before them.

“I told Lady Lynesse we might find you both here,” Catelyn said. She was smiling; Lady Mormont was as well, but her mouth did not match her eyes.

Jorah rose more slowly than was strictly necessary, the glint in his eyes challenging, but it was the obvious affection beneath his annoyance that troubled Ned. When Lord Mormont offered an arm to guide his wife back to the hall, not bothering to mask his pleasure when she accepted, her slight fingers brushing her husband’s sleeve, he wondered how far his bannerman would go for this woman he loved.

Neither had expected the tragedies of their lives; Ned’s brother and sister dead, Jorah’s wife gone without an heir, two rebellions fought within a decade’s time, and just as the words of his house forewarned the coming of the cold, Ned himself could feel another change in the wind as looped his arm through Catelyn’s and followed their guests inside.

 

**1) Winterfell, 304 AL**

She found him in the Godswood, alone.

“Ser Jorah?”

His eyes did not lift from the pool of water in front of him, where he seemed to be trying to read his own reflection as though it were a difficult tome.

 Her knight had been silent since well before their arrival in Winterfell, and had disappeared shortly thereafter. Only after more than an hour’s time – and Lady Sansa’s asking whether the Queen had one fewer knight at her side than she had arrived with – did she realize Jorah was not standing beside her.

She had not known where even to begin to search for him, but Sansa had offered that her mother had often found her father, on similar occasions, sitting by the heart tree, and sure enough, there he sat. _Do all Northmen share the same habits?_ Dany had nearly forgotten that her knight had been a bannerman to House Stark until she saw his face turn to stone at the sight of the burned and broken walls of Winterfell, the falling towers, the smell of blood and ruin that lingered there still despite all of Lady Stark’s repairs.

In Vaes Tolorro she had pushed him to tell her of his ghosts, but here she did not need to ask. Her kingdom was littered with remnants of the dead, from Sunspear to the Wall, her people all living in their shadows.

“Do you intend to return to the hall today? You will find it difficult to protect your queen from all the way out here, I expect.”

He did not reply but to finally tear his gaze from the ground and examine her instead. Dany waited, forbade herself to turn away as he searched her face, until at last he nodded slowly and rose to his feet.

Carefully - the way she might have reached out to a nervous horse - she let him see her hand, gave him time to pull back before brushing the dark brand across his cheek.

Her knight never said a word, did not move but to let her hand drop on its own, yet Dany knew it was enough, and she was gratified, at least, to note that between the heart tree and the hall her knight did not look back to meet the carved eyes that followed them, leaking red sap like tears. 


End file.
